terça-feira, dezembro 12, 2006

Incêndio numa clínica de recuperação para toxicodependentes

INCÊNDIO EM MOSCOU MATA MULHERES COM HIV.

Correio Braziliense e Folha de São Paulo trazem a notícia do incêndio numa clínica de recuperação para dependentes químicos em Moscou que matou 45 mulheres entre pacientes e funcionárias. A psicóloga do hospital Olga Rudakova disse à emissora NTV que as vítimas eram em sua maioria mulheres com menos de 35 anos, dependentes químicas e infectadas pelo vírus HIV, muitas delas com distúrbios psicológicos. A polícia não descarta que o incêndio tenha sido criminoso. Mas o Ministério de Emergências disse ter pedido ao um tribunal em março o fechamento do hospital por violações nas normas de segurança contra incêndio, incluindo as barras nas janelas e escadas inadequadas.
Fonte: Imprensa - Programa Nacional de DST e Aids <imprensa@aids.gov.br>

Comunicado de imprensa acerca do incêndio:

Inhumane conditions in the Russian drug treatment facilities
are the roots of Moscow’s tragedy


December 11, 2006

The Russian Harm Reduction Network (RHRN) and the International Treatment Preparedness Coalition / Region of Eastern Europe and Central Asia (ITCPru) express deep condolences to the families of people who died in the fire in the drug treatment hospital #17 in Moscow, as well as to those who were injured during the fire and to the hospital personnel.

On December 09, 2006 the Office of the Procecutor General of the Russian Federation announced initiation of criminal cases under two articles: malicious destruction of property and disregard of fire safety resulting in death.
While we support the need for a just an unbiased investigation into this tragedy, our collective expertise as activists and professionals working in the areas of drugs and HIV/AIDS shows that the problem is as systemic as it is individual.
RHRN and ITCPru assert that the cause of the tragedy is rooted in the inhumane and ineffective organisation of drug treatment in Russia, and is not merely due to the negligence of separate individuals.

“Conditions within drug treatment facilities in Russia remind more of prisons than hospitals,” – said Vitaly Djuma, the Executive Director of the Russian Harm Reduction Network, which unites providers of harm reduction services to drug users from all over Russia.
“In the rest of the modern world this approach to treatment was banned decades ago. Cells, bars, insensitive personnel, indifference to the lives of their patients – all these add up to cause of the tragedy. The problem is not of a just one particular hospital, this is the problem of the whole system.”

Specialists and activists agree that whatever the results of the investigation, we shouldn’t blame selected individuals be them patients or personnel of the hospital. We especially denounce placing the blame on a woman in severe pain and suffering, for breaking the fire. The distribution of discriminative and speculative disinformation in press before the end of the investigation is yet one more part of the systemic problem that creates general public antipathy towards the victims.

“Blaming separate individuals means closing one’s eyes on the fact that the whole system of drug treatment in Russia is absolutely ineffective, inhumane and discredited, – says Gregory Vergus of the International Treatment Preparedness Coalition, an association which unites HIV activists from around the world, including those from Newly Independent States and the Baltics.
“What is called ‘narcological assistance’ in this country in fact isn’t assistance at all.
help someone just by stuffing them with neuroleptics and barbiturates, turning them into ‘vegetables’ and then letting them back home with a dropped dose. In Russia we lack any systems of real aid to people who use drugs. There is no substitution treatment, and there are no effective and affordable rehabilitation treatment programs. The state-run system of drug treatment remains a sheer example of repressive psychiatry left untouched from the Soviet times.”

We call upon the state officials and journalists to stop spreading unexamined information discriminating not only the clinic’s patients but all people why suffer drug dependency and live with HIV.

We call upon the Office of Prosecutor General to carry out just and unprejudiced investigation taking into consideration all the details and involving into the investigation people who from their own experience are familiar with the regime and specifics of procedures in the drug treatment hospital #17 – the clinic’s patients or representatives of drug users groups such as NGO Kolodetz.

And, most importantly, we call upon the Ministry of Health and Social Development of the Russian Federation to revise the very foundations of the concept of the drug treatment assistance in the country.
Patients should not be treated as prison inmates, doctors should not serve as jail-keepers.
Russian drug treatment lags far behind the effective modern models by dozens years. There is an urgent need to novelise all the system and review its basic principles. Respect to a human being, a patient, his or her rights, willingness to help and solve problems in cooperation between doctor and patient should become the foundations of the drug treatment in Russia

We grieve about the tragedy of December 9. We grieve about 45 women died.
This tragedy deeply touched each one of us as one cannot easily forget what has happened. In our hearts and memories the day of December 9 left its painful mark.
Our love and condolences to the relatives and close ones of those who died in the tragedy.

Anya Sarang,
Russian Harm Reduction Network, Moscow, Russia
Anya@harmreduction.ru +7 926 500 4818

Gregory Vergus,
International Treatment Preparedness Coalition, Saint Petersburg, Russiagregory.vergus@gmail.com +7 911 949 1864

The Russian Harm Reduction Network calls the international community foractions: please send your support letters to the Russian embassies from yourcountries <http://www.russianembassy.biz/> http://www.russianembassy.biz/ or send your letter to the Russian Ministry of Health, for Mikhail Zurabov.

You may try the following fax numbers: + 7095 504 4446, + 7095 959 8356 or+7095 628 50 58.

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